Nucleophilic Attack of Hydroxide on a MnV Oxo Complex: A Model of the O−O Bond Formation in the Oxygen Evolving Complex of Photosystem II

Abstract
A manganese(III) corrole complex, 1, has been synthesized and used to study a potential mechanism for oxidation of water to molecular oxygen. Oxidation by t-BuOOH gave the MnV═O complex 2. Addition of hydroxide led to release of oxygen via the MnIV complex 4 and regeneration of complex 1. It could be shown that the oxygen from 18O-labeled water was incorporated in both the formed molecular oxygen and the peroxy intermediate 4.